Death of a father, married with young children and debts

doodling

Hi,

Based on the figures, the wife needs to find £25k (and continue to be responsibe for the mortgage/HTB loan) to pay the estate for the deceased's share of the house.

That £25k, plus the £1k ISA then needs to be used to pay for the funeral and the debts (with the money being shared between the creditors according to the rules for insolvent estates).

As the house is jointly owned probate (actually Letters of Administration) is not required but the estate does need to be properly administered to avoid whoever is administering it ending up personally liable for the debts (e.g . by not allocating the available money correctly across the creditors).

The £150k insurance payout would ideally be the source of the £25k the wife needs to take full beneficial ownership of the house (she is already the sole legal owner).

player

Ok thank you for the recent replies, the tenancy in common has made an awful situation worse.

I will contact a suitable charity first, before notifying any creditors of the estimated balance of the estate.

Savvy_Sue

It's a long shot, but was he in a line of work which might have a professional or benevolent association? 

eg https://www.licensedtradecharity.org.uk/ for pub / off-licence workers

there seem to be a couple for electricians, possibly two for plumbers, gardeners etc ... 

Silvertabby

Also a long shot, but did he go self-employed as soon as he left school/college?  It would be unusual if he did, so may be worth checking to see if he worked for someone else before striking out himself.  He could have some small pension benefits if he worked for the public sector or a large private company.  

player

I have searched for a few policies but without luck, fortunately he did have £25k in a pension which we should be able to access.

Regarding the house and the figures keep_peddling has calculated it appears his estate will be worth around £25k but I did use perhaps an optimistic house valuation figure. You could argue the house to be worth £25k less, in which case he'd be rendered insolvent.